Can't find internship / graduate job anywhere despite top target and BB summer internship
I am in my final year at a target university, and have applied to over 80 jobs and internships since not recieveing a return offer from my internship last summer. I have not been invited for a single interview. I had people I know at Blackstone and JP Morgan look over my CV to help me understand the problem, and both said that my CV looked good and they couldn't understand why I haven't been getting interviews. I now graduate in 4 months and am incredibly anxious about the prospect of not having a job - I need to decide soon whether to extend my lease etc.
I am posting on here to ask two questions, firstly, to ask if anyone on here would be willing to look at my CV and help me understand what I can do to be a more attractive candidate, and secondly, to ask advice for alternative pathways to IB. I have already applied to most IB, Accounting, Credit Risk, Corporate Banking, Consulting, Corp Dev internships/full time roles that I can find at a wide variety of firms - I was even rejected when I applied to be an estate agent lol.
I would greatly appreciate any insight.
Have you been just applying to the top companies in each of these sectors you mentioned? May need to apply to other no name firms
I have been applying to everything on trackr and linkedin and have Google alerts for any off cycle internship mentioning credit/IB/PE/AM etc. Lots of firms I have never heard of.
I have been applying to firms with less than 20 employees on linkedin. Any opportunity I can find that is somewhat relevant
Really weird then
Are you diversity/ female / local Brit?
London recruiting is really random tbh
I am British white male. I am gay but I don't think they care that much about that for DEI.
You need to refine your approach and try to network effectively.
What does this even mean in a practical sense?
You want someone to make an internal referral for you.
When I was recruiting out of undergrad, I made a spreadsheet of companies I wanted to work for and wrote down some contacts there. I called many of them or went to events I knew they would be at to try and impress them. I even played golf with one guy to get an interview at BX. Many times the internal referrals got me interviews.
https://www.wallstreetoasis.com/forum/investment-banking/london-summer-analyst-recruiting-is-so-random
incredibly random process in London unfortunately
hi, continental background here. Do not worry you are much more advanced in timeline than a 28-year old German intern
would advise you to apply for offcycle internships in UK, or Investment banking traineeship programs at French banks in UK (SocGen, etc.)
Offcycle internships can often lead to full/time positions, if you do not convert you do another one. French bank traineeships do not convert mostly, it’s 11 month contract that can be renewed for another 11 month. But even if you do not convert, if you are in a front office IB team you can land decent full time jobs after you get the renewal (1-1.5 years in). Think MM boutique / EB level exit
French GE system or a target master in UK also decent. Année de césure in France allows you to do 6-month offcycle internships and apply for summers in Uk once again.
Consider your situation as a good start - better than many continental European candidates at your age
Thank you for your advice. I am mainly applying to off cycle internships, I think that is the most likely way for me to break into finance. I am just struggling to find many openings at the moment. I actually did make it to a first round interview for a private credit off cycle internship recently but annoyingly I didn’t make it to the second stage, with them telling me that my interview was great and it has nothing to do with my experience, et cetera. It was just that they “had a large quantity of experienced applicants and they had to make some hard decisions”. Why do you suggest looking for roles besides LinkedIn and periodically checking the website of certain companies?
it will be open soon before summer for Sep/Jan start so keep an eye. You are a bit young but never take these interview feedback for real - if you do not get to second round it does mean that your interview is worse than others or you lack experience (considering our dear German intern who had multiple internships on the belt, or French student who do 2*6 months internships and they both speak continental languages)
Why didn’t you get the return last summer?
Annoyingly they were super vague… I got very positive feedback the entire summer and was even told a week before the end of the internship that I have nothing to worry about, and then it came as a surprise on the last day of the internship that I didn’t get the return. They cited the reason as being last minute headcount changes and they had to make some hard decisions. According to someone who got a return offer, I was the cut-off person apparently.
Quia veniam ad ab veritatis. Et non et est. Quasi nostrum earum praesentium facere ut.
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